


Songs of Lovers and Maidens

by Adadzio



Series: Character/Relationship Studies [7]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: Awkward Flirting, Developing Relationship, Drabble Collection, Extramarital Affairs, F/M, Firsts, Fluff and Angst, Public Display of Affection, Secret Relationship, Stolen Moments
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-12-28
Updated: 2017-02-04
Packaged: 2018-05-09 21:39:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 32
Words: 10,542
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5556491
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Adadzio/pseuds/Adadzio
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A compilation of Lobster Flambe drabble requests/challenges.</p><p>
  <i>She looked up at him with those red, red eyes, and he felt he was trapped in a blazing fire.</i>
</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Hands

[ ](http://histruequeen.tumblr.com/post/144125539214/the-king-sharing-a-cloak-with-his-lady)

* * *

 

Somewhere there is movement. All she feels is her hand being pulled, her body stumbling forward. Instinct kicks in, and she panics. Her hand darts within her red sleeves to find the right powder, any powder,  _anything to stop this man—_

But this man knows her better than anyone. Before she can fling her sorcery at him, he catches her delicate fingers in his rough ones. Melisandre throws her weight in the opposite direction, and then she finally glimpses him. Relief floods her veins, but her heart is still hammering. 

She composes herself and asks him to forgive her. She will not admit that he startled her.

He will not point out that he already knows. For a long minute he does not let go, and the wind and snow whip around them in an urgent beat. It is far too noisy, yet so very silent. 

“It wasn’t supposed to happen like that,” he says dryly. She has no idea what he means. All amusement drops from Stannis’s face. “You truly don’t know?” Her white fingers are still held in a bruising grip. He brushes them against his lips. 

Scarlet eyes widen as if in accusation. This is her king, and she is relieved it is him. All the same, she jerks back her hand as if he has harmed her, as if  _he_  is the one who burns. 

It is entirely silent now; she is sure that the wind has ceased to blow, and the dark North itself has succumbed to rest. She opens her mouth to apologize again, but he shakes his head. By the time he pulls her hands back to him, they are shaking, no matter how forcefully she tries to calm them. He coaxes ten white fingers to his mouth this time, presses ten clumsy kisses to her trembling fists. 

Somewhere in a distant lifetime, the priestess has heard songs of lovers and maidens. She knows it is not supposed to happen like this. 

Somewhere, in some hidden part of her heart, she is glad that it did.


	2. Vows

She comes to him like some scarlet siren in the night. He supposes he is drowning, that first time, and it is her voice which lures him into the warmth of the sin. She is red, his priestess—so red, and so very confounding. She comes to him in tents, on battlefields, his bedchamber at Dragonstone. 

It goes on for about a year.

Davos is long returned; his knight of fish and onions, his trusted Hand. They bicker awhile, as only the most intimate of friends do, and finally he admits his wretched error. When Melisandre comes to him that night, he tells her he has no need of her. 

She only smiles and wraps herself in red silk once more. “Another evening, mayhaps.”

Not tomorrow, or the evening after, or the evening after, he argues. Her eyes shine like burning embers in the night.

“I do not understand, my king.”

He tells her it is wrong, as he has a thousand nights before. He tells her that things are different now, that he means to be an honest man, a just man, and an honorable king. He tells her he has broken his vows far too long. 

“Vows before false gods,” she hisses, and he swears he can see flames beneath the cracks of her composure. 

 _How had he forgotten?_   She is fire,  _yes_ , fire barely controlled beneath a layer of cool porcelain. 

All the same, he is dumbfounded by her anger. “Do you mean to claim my marriage void?” 

Her recovery is swift, of course. “No, my king,” she rambles smoothly. “Forgive me, I meant no offense against you, against your rightful queen.” But no words can stitch up the crack completely; it is torn far too wide for that. 

“My lady,” he sighs. It has gone on for about a year, this madness, and he vows to end it now. 

Then her burning lips are on his neck, and perhaps it can go on another year.


	3. Lessons

“Please stop complaining.”

“I am not complaining, woman. I am stating that this is impossible.”

“It was your idea,” she points out. 

Stannis scowls down at her. “Hold still and be _quiet._ ” 

She smiles in that unsettling way of hers. “It requires patience, my king, and much practice.” 

His fingers dip in again and pull out roughly, earning another stifled gasp from his priestess. “Gentler,” she advises. “Each movement must be deliberate and fluid, else you will never get it right.” 

The king narrows his eyes.  _Gods, how difficult can it be?_ He need only push aside his irritation and focus. 

_In and out. Steady motions._

“Better,” she praises.

Soon his fingers are moving with more intent, more ease and confidence, and by the look on her face, he can tell it will soon be finished. 

“My king!” she gasps.

He wonders if that is a good sign, but then she slithers contentedly against his chest, and he decides that it must be. 

“You are a fast learner…when you cease to complain.” She runs a graceful hand over the fiery length of her hair. “Your technique is quite improved!”

His priestess is satisfied, and he is too, but his voice is still a grumble. “Shireen’s was never so difficult to braid.”


	4. Stories

Her fingers trace a burning, graceful path down his chest, running over each bone, each sinewy muscle. His fingers are not so agile. He catches her wrist in a grip that is not gentle. “I will take my rest now,” he tells her, righting his clothing. 

_Very well, my king._ He is surprised when she remains at his side, rather than moving to her chair by the fire, but no protest leaves his mouth. 

Sleep does not find him easily that night. Perhaps it is his usual anxiety, or because the chamber is too damned hot, or because his priestess is still lying in his bed, her bare skin brushing his arm. The infernal woman knows, of course. And she will ask so he never, ever has to.  _May I soothe you in some way, my king?_

The idea is frivolous and entirely too dangerous. But he finally turns to watch her. “I would have a story." 

Her smile is teasing. "A song? Or truly a story, as if for a young boy?” This inspires him to grind his teeth. 

“A story. A history, rather." 

_Very well, my king_. She prods further, and he speaks the words without thought. "Why do you never sleep?" 

There is a glint of surprise in her bloody eyes. "I do not require it. The Lord— " 

"And before you did not require it? Was Melony, too, afraid to dream?" 

That red gaze becomes hard. "I would not know that story, my king." 

"Wouldn’t you? It’s yours to tell.” He does not mean to be cruel, but the words are, and they force all her pleasantries to the wayside. 

“Don’t say that,” she says tightly, “Don’t ever say that.” He tries to say her name instead, to explain himself, but she misinterprets the sound. “ _Don’t_ ,” she hisses, ready to fly from the bed and the threat it poses. He catches her before she can, and it feels like catching his lost, broken Proudwing. There is a painfully long silence. 

“Forgive my foolishness.” For some reason he traces her invisible tears with calloused thumbs. “Forgive your wretched king.” She is frowning carefully, as if she is trying very hard not to cry, and there is an infuriating ache in his chest. 

“Please, my king. It is I who acted wrongly.”

That is true; she is the one who has spoken so insolently to a king, but all he can think is how the fire casts orange shadows upon her pale cheek, and  _gods_ ,  _she is the most beautiful, sad woman in the world_. “Come,” he murmurs, and she allows him to draw her into his gaunt chest once more. 

“Would you still enjoy a song?” Her voice is light and teasing, but he knows better. He knows his shadow like he knows his own mind. 

“That is yours to command, my lady. As am I.”


	5. Rubies

It is night, but she will not be afraid, even when they approach the outset of the silent forest.

Her white hand finds his between layers of wool and silk and fur. “It is so dark,” she frets. Stannis pulls her in anyway, and the bare trees cast spindly shadows upon the spires of his crown. “My king— ”

“Close your eyes,” he advises. “I will guide you.” 

It is the last thing the priestess wishes to do, but she obeys, clenching her eyes tightly against the threatening images before her. True to his word, he tugs her by the hand, and she stumbles, all grace forgotten in her terror. Deeper and deeper he pulls her, and she can feel her fingers trembling beneath his rough grip. “Where are we going?” she demands, and he snorts at her impatience. 

“Here.” Then his hand is gone, and her heart constricts in panic, but she cannot possibly open her eyes now, because there is nothing but pitch black behind her eyelids.

“My king,” she pleads. R’hllor is merciful; he is there, just behind her. A hand finds her waist, and the other coaxes something hard and cool into her clenched fist. “What am I holding?”

“Open your eyes, and you may answer that yourself.” Eventually she does. It is very quiet, this white clearing in the woods. Snow drifts lazily about them, settling upon frozen branches, on her scarlet boots, in her scarlet hair. Her scarlet eyes flicker down at her hand, still clenching the mysterious object. It nearly slithers to the ground as she turns her palm over. 

“To match the one at your neck,” he explains. 

Ruby glints back in the moonlight, encrusted within delicate yellow flames. Finally she sees that it is an intricate circlet, though she does not understand why it is in her hand. He settles it over her wind-blown hair, and the stones drip down her braid and forehead like frozen blood. It is a strange weight. Thrilling.  _Illicit_.

The king is well aware of this. “Will you wear it when we are alone?” 

Melisandre sighs, listening to the wind. It makes a gentle song this night. “When we are alone,” she agrees. They watch the black sky a while longer, their heads covered in matching flames of gold, and she is not afraid.


	6. Shadows

Stannis Baratheon is not asentimental man. He does not give the feverish dream any worth. He is not sentimental, but the words echo in his chamber. The fields of the Stormlands are green and damp in his mind. Even Renly’s peach is fresh in his memory. It is sweet as a peach should be, but its juice runs bitter through the dream, like poison and smoke and blood.

_Brother,_   _you cannot turn me away._

His brother is no longer here with his damned peach, and winter turns the fields brown. Stannis Baratheon is not a sentimental man, but there is such overwhelming sadness in the thought that he is paralyzed on the edge of the bed, eyes haunted, locked upon the dancing flames. 

His red shadow is not sentimental either, but she sits with him in silence. “The night is dark,” she agrees. Then she rests her head against his shoulder, because there is nothing else to do. 

Stannis Baratheon is not a sentimental man, but when she sings, it brings emotion to his eyes. He is not sentimental, but even he can see they are a sad image, sitting useless in his cold bedchamber. “Leave me,” he grits out, infuriated by the thought. 

She turns to him, eyes shining far too red. Her words make every hair on his body stand on end. 

“You cannot turn me away.” 

Stannis Baratheon is not a sentimental man, but  _by gods,_  she is right. He cannot turn away this enigma of a woman. 

The fire devours his brother’s peach, and still they watch the flames, lost in the shadows of the mess they themselves have made. 


	7. Stars

His boots feel confining as he pulls them on. Pacing the room, he wonders if they sound as heavy as they feel. From his priestess’s wince, they do.

“Forgive me,” she pleads, watching him from the edge of her bed. She does not bother to straighten her own disheveled appearance. “It was only an instinct…I just thought, somehow, I might die— ”

“I need air,” Stannis interrupts, feeling quite ill. He strides abruptly from her room. 

Her nimble footsteps are lost behind his stomping. “My king…” 

He tells her to return to her bedchamber, but she stubbornly follows him through the silent black courtyard, seemingly unaffected by the sharp, icy wind against her bare neck and arms. He tells her to obey him. She does just the opposite, hurrying to keep up with his long strides, staying as close behind as she can, quiet and quick as a shadow.  _His red shadow._

By the time he reaches the ancient lift, he has given up ordering her away—she only pretends not to hear. He barks at the slumbering knight to bring them to the top of the Wall. Melisandre wisely says nothing on the journey up.

When the lift comes to a creaking halt at the top of the ice, she hesitates. Most of the fire pits have blown out along the Wall, and no men are awake to rekindle them. He sighs impatiently, glancing back at her. “If you are not certain about this— ”

“No,” she says quickly, “I must speak with you, I must—explain myself. Here, if that is where it must be.” 

They walk a while through the frozen sky before she ventures to do so. “I never meant to offend you, my king.”  _Fine words, but little use._  Her cheek presses against his arm, and he feels the heat even through his cloak. She tries again, voice half as sure as it usually is. “It is only…no man ever….” 

_Oh._

He should not care. It is a sinful mistake each and every time they crawl into each other’s beds. It happens too many times to count, so many times it shames him to the core and he feels he’ll never be honourable again. They use each other and they are well aware of it. Sometimes they are angry and bitter with the world. More often they are tense with anxiety and crippling doubt, desperate for any small relief. 

But this night had been different. Guilt had not prickled him as he ran his hands over her pale skin, as he admired the rosy flush spreading over her chest. For once it was not a mindless release, but an opportunity to understand her. It was the first time her entire body had trembled with pleasure— _genuine_ pleasure _._ His own satisfaction was far greater for it. 

Then, like a damned fool, he had tried to kiss her. Cold horror swept over him when she jerked back in tears, even more so when she tried to explain. _“It was only an instinct…I just thought, somehow, I might die— ”_

Now she is coaxing him to the edge of the Wall, and he’s certain he’ll be the one to tumble to his gruesome death.  _How fitting._ The north seems a great black ocean, speckled with tiny silver stars. Melisandre turns expectantly toward him, and he decides her eyes are the brightest of all, two scarlet stars flickering and burning in the night. 

Stannis realises he’s been silent. “You didn’t mean to offend me?” he repeats coolly. “How, when you invite me into your company, then reject my…”  _Advances? Affections?_ It all seems so foolish now, so petty, and he is humiliated that he ever cared about it.

“I will not turn away this time,” she whispers. 

It takes several long minutes to grind his teeth and set his mind to it. True to her word, she does not wince when his rough lips meet her ruby ones. She does not duck her head, or weep, or escape to her chair by the fire. “I still feel as if I am dying,” she confesses. He does too, caught dizzy and exposed and helpless, but they wait a moment, and neither of them actually perish. She leans up again.

It it early morning when they stumble back to her little bed at Castle Black. There they truly  _do_  die, half a dozen times. 

Stannis has never felt so alive. 


	8. Warnings

"Who were you walking with, just now?”

Melisandre brushed her wind-swept hair behind her shoulder, allowing the rich copper to stream wildly down her back. “The Lord Commander, your Grace. He is in surprisingly good spirits today.” 

A deeper frown formed over the king’s dour face. “Come here,” he ordered.  

“For what purpose, Sire?”

“I’m marking you so that everyone will know who you belong to.”

The priestess froze, lifting an eyebrow. A long, incredulous silence followed. Stannis remained grave and unwavering behind his desk. “I don’t have all day,” he snapped.  

Eventually she sighed and sauntered over to him, eyeing his seated form like a scarlet hawk. Once she was within reach he caught her arm and tugged her into his lap. “Good spirits,” he muttered. “With you hanging off his arm, I imagine so.” 

Melisandre’s delicate fingers found the shadow of his beard, tracing his wan skin, the hard lines of his jaw. ”Do you truly feel threatened by him?” Her thoughts were cut short at the feel of his own hands at her pale throat. 

”It’s not a matter of feeling threatened. It’s a warning to any man who dares approach you.” 

Rough fingers ghosted the faint lines beneath her ruby choker, and her red eyes fluttered shut. “You can only  _mark_  me so many times,” she breathed, a coy smile tugging at her lips. Her hips shifted against his growing arousal, eliciting a tortured groan from him. 

“Indeed. Then I must needs be more direct.” 

“How so?”

He leaned back slightly, seeking relief from her heat. “By removing any hand that touches you.” 

A moment passed as his declaration sunk in. Melisandre blinked. “Except yours,” she clarified.

“Except mine.” He watched her carefully. “Do you doubt my sincerity?” 

“No,” she admitted.

“So you won’t test me?”

The priestess smiled and tilted her head, rolling her hips against his once more. “Oh, I will,” she promised. 

* * *

_[[More of this Stannis/Mel](http://t.umblr.com/redirect?z=http%3A%2F%2Farchiveofourown.org%2Fseries%2F289124&t=YTMwMjQ5ZDRmYTg5NjgwMmM5ZWQ3ZmFhMzgwMjBjMjYyZmZmNzAxMCxERGF0OEplTA%3D%3D)]_


	9. Reunions

Today he hears his lady’s voice again, clear and melodious; a song he had nearly forgotten on the long, frozen months of his march. 

When his retinue turns, she leads her own to take the knee—she, far more gracefully than her ragged men. Loose copper hair falls to cover her pale face, and the king is caught half in turning, half frozen at the sight of the red priestess in the snow. Finally he manages to flick his fingers up.

Her body is a fiery blur before any of the others can hobble to their feet. All at once her arms are thrown about his neck, drawing a sharp breath from every man in the courtyard. To their shock, Stannis does not fling the woman away from him, or condemn her audacious behavior. Rather, his arms catch her slender waist to lift her slightly off the ground. 

 _Your Grace —_ the words spill hurriedly from her red lips —  _how I have prayed, hour upon hour, night after night—and you, my king?_ _Have you honoured R’hllor in the flames, offered your praise and thanks for your victory?_

He presses his forehead to hers with a sigh.  _I thought only of your warmth, searching only for your red eyes._

_My king…_

_Yes, my lady._  The corner of his grim mouth tugs upward.After a moment he lowers her to the ground, but she remains stubbornly on tip toe. Sensing that the two will not part any time soon, Devan stumbles to direct royal servants to the King’s Tower. Knights shuffle away to the main hold of Castle Black.

The king pays them no mind, reaching to hold her face in his rough hands.  _Mine own lady, tell me you’ve yearned as I have._

_Oh, my king, you know I—_

_My lady Melisandre—_

She quiets him. Thaws the ice in his bones with her very presence. His priestess is soft and warm as a waning flame, the heat of her skin almost painful after so long in the cold.

He knows he should restrain himself, or at the least tug her up the stairs to privacy. Yet he cannot bring himself to. He does not want to hide her away in his rooms—no, not today. He has longed for this day, even  _prayed_  for this day, each and every evening as he stared hollowly into the flames. During those unbearable nights he dreamed of kissing his priestess in the snow, of showing the entire world his depraved recklessness. 

Today, he does just that.


	10. Dreams

The first time he witnesses her falling asleep, he does not know what to think. It relieves him, somehow; feeds his fascination. Puzzles him beyond resolution. 

_She is human, after all?_

That first time she stirs in her sleep, her brow furrowing, hands clenched into pale fists, he is plagued by even stranger yearnings.

“I was not sleeping,” she insists, blinking the sleep from her eyes like a red doe.

He refuses to stare at the lily-white thighs peeking from under her scarlet robe. “You fooled me easily,” he says dryly. She does not drift back off, nor does she move to her chair by the fire. Her red eyes watch him like a hawk watches its prey. “What are you waiting for?” he demands, unsettled by her scrutiny. Unsettled by  _her_.

Melisandre does not answer him at first. Eventually she curls those hands about his arm, glancing at the closed shutters. “The night is dark and full of terrors, my king. But the morning is on its way.” He frowns, wishing suddenly that he were back in his own chambers. Perhaps he will leave. “Don’t,” she pleads, as if reading his mind. Then it fully dawns on him.

She has been having a nightmare. 

His own voice surprises him. “You know, it's only just a dream.” 

“I know,” she whispers. But she does not remove her hands from his shirtsleeves. His throat feels tight.  _Gods, why is he here? He really should leave._  

Instead he shifts back against the creaking headboard. “I’ll lie next to you,” he says shortly. The surprise in her eyes is more beautiful than he would prefer. By the time her copper hair is tickling his chest, he is panicked. Her skin is silk, her hair is warmth.  _How will he survive a night with her pressed up next to him?_ She cannot see his panic, however. Her strange eyes have fluttered shut once more, and all he can do is sigh. “You’ll be alright,” he tells her. “The morning is on its way.”

She sees such terror in the night, but Stannis watches her sleep, and he sees only beauty.

 

* * *

 


	11. Storms

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: "I like how you stare"

He stops dead at the sight of  _her_  at the top of the stair. Her hair catches the candlelight, like a river of molten copper.  _Or fire._  Sometimes he thinks she  _is_  fire, his priestess from Asshai. So warm and red is she, so soft and flowing in her scarlet silks, so beckoning her gaze as she turns to consider him in return. She is like fire this way. And every other way. 

The curve of her lips betrays her awareness of his lingering gaze. Stannis is suddenly jolted out of his study, abruptly back in the grim austerity of the Stone Drum. 

“Are you searching for some answer?” she asks softly.

He can feel the tips of his ears burning. All around them the chamber of the painted table is echoing with the  _booms_  of the nightly storm. He grits his teeth. “Only why I seem to find you here at all hours, any time I seek a moment alone with my map.” He clenches his fist and moves to the head of the table resolutely. “Mayhaps you see my sleeplessness in your fires, woman, and you seek to appear wherever I might.”

The priestess tilts her head as she is wont to do. The action reminds him of a child, a girl with a heart-shaped face, eyes bright and alight with amusement. “I do not mind it,” she says, as if confiding a great secret.  

The words catch him off guard. “Mind  _what?”_

Melisandre smiles again, and he suddenly wonders how he ever looked away. “I like how you stare, your Grace.” 


	12. Stockings

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prompt: Stannis gives Mel stockings *-*

They were red— _of course_ —but the familiarity stopped there.

The priestess considered the knit silk, so fine and rich in the deepest hue of crimson. Her fingers ghosted over the intricate gold embroidery swirling atop long lengths of fabric, relishing the slightly raised texture where little rubies had been sewn into the silk. It was better to consider that lovely top portion, loose red ribbons and all, than to gaze at the bottom of it.  _The bottom is very ugly,_  she thought. It was woven off in a rather strange shape.

"Do they not please you?" Stannis demanded. 

Melisandre blinked out of her study. "Yes. Thank you, my king.” She tilted her head, weighing her words carefully. “And…what are they for?" 

He gave her a queer look. "For you to wear.” Still uncertain, she lifted a scarlet eyebrow and made to slip the odd garment over her knuckles. The king chuckled and caught her slender hand. "Not there, my shadow. They are stockings." 

"Oh," said Melisandre. A long moment passed as she considered the idea. Stannis frowned in return. "They are very fine," she said politely, sensing his anxiety. "Only…" 

_"Only what?"_

Melisandre pursed her lips. "It seems silly to wear a glove on one’s legs." 

Amusement tugged at the king’s grim mouth once more. "Men have such things. Women should also have them, to protect their skin from the elements."

"Women do not have such things where I come from," she said dryly. 

Stannis knelt before her to trap her red boot in his grasp, seemingly reassured in his choice of gift. "But this is the North. All fine ladies wear them here." 

"I am no fine lady," she muttered. 

He slipped the boot off and worked the woven red silk over her pale toes before she could grimace further. She shivered when he paused to stroke her heel slightly. "You are the king's lady, and that is fine indeed.” Her cheeks felt warm, even more so as he dragged the hem of her robe up. Once the heavy scarlet fabric was resting above her knees, he used both hands to smooth the first stocking around her delicate ankle, over her calf, all the way up to her ivory thigh. There he used the loose silk ribbons to secure the garment in a hasty bow. “There. See how it fares.”

Melisandre pulled a face but obeyed, holding up her robe and glancing down at her silk-clad leg. “It is…” Just then she caught sight of his blue gaze, darkened up at her like the skies of the Stormlands. Her heart picked up in rhythm. “What  _truly_  is the purpose of such a garment? For a woman as I, immune to the chill?” 

He cleared his throat like a skittish boy. “It—is pleasant attire. It suits you.”

The priestess did not miss the longing in his low voice. After a moment, she smiled coyly and extended the other leg. “Then mayhaps you will attend this one as well, my king?”

Rough hands found her bare skin before she could blink. “I shall attend it most thoroughly,” Stannis promised. 


	13. Babies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **5 sentence fic:** "shadowbabies"

Shadowbinding is painful. 

That particular aspect of the art, she does not share with Stannis. It is difficult enough— _R’hllor, it is difficult_ —to make her way into the Stormland king’s bed the first time. The second time she takes his seed for that particular purpose, she fails to hide her wince for the pain to come. 

Shadowbinding is painful,  _excruciating_ , but this time her storm king holds her in his tent, and the pleasure drowns out the pain. 


	14. Comforts

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **5 sentence fic prompt:** "Sam and Maester Aemon talk Stannis/Melisandre"

“She is wrong about him, and Stannis knows she is wrong.” 

Sam shifted in his seat. “If that is so, how can she still be at his side?” 

The old maester’s lips curled up, his blind expression speaking of pleasant nights long gone, of autumn dreams long withered and summer comforts long forgotten. “As I say to Jon Snow…what is duty, Samwell, compared to a woman's love?”


	15. Eyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **5 sentence fic prompt:** baby

Davos wants to throttle her when he sees her.  _Not the child, of course—_ the red priestess, the bloody siren who’s had the audacity to name her bastard Cassana. 

_It was in the letter, Ser Davos, it was his final wish._ Melisandre always claims and believes queer things; she always has and she always will, even with a shattered soul and a broken heart.  

Suddenly the babe opens her eyes, and Davos is looking into the clear blue gaze of his fallen king, and he cannot hate her. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Based upon [_Call Her Cassana_ ]](http://archiveofourown.org/works/5185301/chapters/12022853)


	16. Lips

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt** : first kiss

Heat is flooding the king’s pavilion like a feverish plague he cannot quell. Stannis wonders why so many damned candles are lit, his skin itching at the first feel of perspiration. It is then he sees the soft scarlet figure lingering in the shadows. 

_Her._

As if sensing his trepidation, her body moves forward. She is red and shapeless, wrapped up in those bloody silks which mask her pale face and ruby lips from him.  _Her lips._  Just then he realises he’s been staring at them beneath the wispy veil. 

_No—he should not—_

But  _she_  is leaning forward, the priestess, and he is so horrified he cannot move away. In one smooth motion she’s uncovered her head, maddening lips and all, and touched them to his. 

They are warm, he discovers.  _And so red._  Soon they become redder, as if stained by pomegranates or berries or a deep cherry wine. He is nearly faint with the intoxication.  

“My king,” she whispers. It is the first time she addresses him so intimately.

Surely it is an impulse, this wild need to taste her further and discover if she is as sweet as she looks. He tells himself it cannot be helped. Neither can his hands be kept from feeling the delicate curve of her waist. Melisandre does taste sweet, but she also burns with the hard force of a wildfire. 

 _My king_ , she sings again and again.  _My king_. 

He does not regret kissing her back.


	17. Kisses

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** a kiss on the neck

The king attempts to move quietly. To find Melisandre sleeping is a rare thing indeed, to see her curled up in her chair before the flames, cheeks flushed and eyes too heavy to keep open…it is enough to gentle his steps. He is a hulking, inelegant man, however. Her slumber is broken by his stumbled undressing.

“My king?” she murmurs, still half drowsing. 

He curses under his breath and hangs his damp cloak over the unoccupied chair. “Mayhaps you should rest abed, my lady.” 

Her red eyes open and close slowly, as if she is trying very hard to stay awake. “I must read the fire…” 

Stannis snorts, shrugging out of his jerkin. “You are doing very little reading.” 

His priestess does not seem to appreciate the jape, irritation clear in her heavy-lidded gaze. He finishes his ablutions over the basin, grateful when she sighs and begins to doze back off. 

She does not stir when he tucks a blanket around her form, nor when he brushes her copper hair to the side. Without thinking, without  _allowing himself to think_ , he leans down behind her and presses his lips to her pale throat. Satisfied with her peaceful state, the king straightens and makes for bed. He does not notice the smile playing at her red lips. 

But later, when the sky begins to lighten and leak through the shutters, he feels those lips brushing  _his_  neck, and wonders if he is dreaming or awake. 


	18. Smiles

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** a kiss on the nose

“Are you cold, my lady?”

She hears the amusement in his tone, but for once she cannot read him and the meaning behind his words. “Never, my king,” Melisandre replies. As if to prove it, her breath burns a path through the frigid air. “Why do you ask?” 

A curt shake of his head, and the question is dismissed. He is trying not to smile, she can tell, for his mouth twitches at the side and he diverts her to continue their walk. 

They say Stannis never smiles, but that is simply untrue. It is his stubborn belief that a lord should be solemn, that a king should hide his happiness.  _There are more important things._ Yet she knows well enough to catch a rare smile before it is stifled. 

The priestess huffs another cloud of steam, pressing up closer to his side and winding her pale hands about his arm. For a while it is peacefully silent as they amble down the icy darkness atop the Wall. 

“You are certain you’re not cold?” 

This time she stops her pace to direct a suspicious look at him. “Are you proposing ways to warm me, my king?” 

Stannis blushes like Devan Seaworth. “Only…” Before he can finish his own thought, he leans down to press his lips to the tip of her nose. Melisandre blinks in surprise, almost flinching at the motion. “Only there,” he clarifies.

She blinks again, feeling a strange, warm flutter in her belly. “W-why?”

The smirk returns to play at his lips. “Your nose is red as your ruby,” he says dryly.


	19. Kisses II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** more than one kiss

Her hair is a tangled halo of copper, blowing idly about her face and tickling his close-cropped beard. The king tugs her by the hand around the building’s edge, and his guards know well enough to remain behind. It is not long after the pair is safely hidden that she dissolves into giggles, red eyes alight with the game. He backs her against the crumbling stone and kisses her into silence. 

“Do you know this tower?” 

Breathless and dazed, Melisandre leans her head back to peer at the crooked structure behind her. “I know what Jon Snow’s men call it. Harlot’s Tower.”

“ _Hardin’s_  Tower,” he corrects with a grimace. “The giant…guards it. More often than not, he’s snoring in the entryway like a great, useless log. Their wild princess will surely be moved to the highest rooms once I'm gone.”

“Val,” she supplies.

“Yes.  _Val.”_

“And the other wildling women. I tell you, my king, Lord Snow’s brothers think it a brothel.” She lifts a scarlet eyebrow in musing. “From the things they whisper, they’d prefer I stayed there as well.”

His blue eyes darken. “You belong in the King’s Tower,” he murmurs. “With me or without me.” Those large hands encircle her waist, lips recapture hers, and it is a long while before either speaks again. 

She does not wish to think about staying there without him, though she knows it will soon be so. In that moment the priestess cannot imagine anything beyond him and his strong arms. 

Snow begins to fall heavier around them, but he does not shift away. “Stannis,” she murmurs. He does not answer. It is oft a challenge to guess the thoughts that war inside her king’s head. She pulls away to rest her head against the stone, her pale chest heaving as she attempts to read him. “Stannis? Would it not please you to continue our walk?”

“It would please me to kiss you,” he says wryly.

Her cheeks feel warm beneath his heated gaze. “Still?” 

“All day.” 

Her skin flushes even rosier. Ice shimmers around her, and the clear sunlight warms her crimson velvet cloak. After a moment, her arms curl about his neck. “No one will find us here,” she concedes.


	20. Tears

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** "I will never leave you. I am your shadow, remember?”

_She is wrong._  The realisation is not truly a realisation, not for him. That does not make it any easier to swallow. 

His priestess is mistaken all along, and even less capable of processing the fact than he. The moment her true Azor Ahai comes blazing through the North with fire and blood, enslaving all darkness in her path, the truth is confirmed, and everyone with eyes can see. The queen’s men see it, his desperate wife sees it. Gods, even Maester Aemon had seen it, and the old man hadn’t even eyes to see.

 _She is wrong._  And still, his priestess cannot see. Her countenance is blank and pale and full of denial. He should taunt her for it, throw her mistakes in her face, watch every careful prophecy and fanatic belief crumble around her like ash and snow. “Leave,” he snaps instead. He must get very far from this siren and her spell. “Leave, and do not dare preach your madness to any other in my kingdoms.”

She’s always been misguided, deluded, and the realisation finally begins to overwhelm her. He knows this because tears drown the fire in her eyes.  _Good._ Yet she still does not  _understand_ , or if she does, refuses to match his cruelty. "I will never leave you,” she whispers, presuming to stroke his gaunt cheeks as she so often does. “You are my champion.” 

 _She is wrong._  She’s always been wrong, will always  _be_  wrong. He is no hero, only a broken man whose wretched life will soon slip away from him. The king knows he must push her away now.  _Spare her further heartbreak._ “I said leave.”

She attempts a sad smile through her tears. “How can I? I am your shadow, remember?” 

 _“You are wrong.”_  

She finally breaks. Her face pales even further, tears spilling over, and it’s unbearable to see sorrow flood from those red, red eyes. He must send her away—he must _, he must—_

Yet when he removes her hand from his cheek, it is simply so he can bring it to his lips, to sate this compulsion to soothe her and calm her. “Not my shadow,” he sighs. “Only my queen.” 


	21. Sickness

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** “Someone has to hold your hair"

By the fourth round of retching, the priestess is thoroughly affronted by the whole experience.  _This was a mistake, an utter mistake…_

“It’s not as if I chose this,” she hisses to no one in particular. Another wave of nausea forces her head back into the basin.  _R’hllor_ ,  _better to smite me where I kneel, or to be caught in the icy grip of the Great Other, than to suffer this horrifying condition!_

At that moment, a tall shadow falls behind her, firm grasp not far behind. She groans aloud. “At last, death delivers me from my torment…” Yet she does not perish when next her body is wracked by violent sickness. Rather, a hand brushes hair from her pale face, gentle and soothing as it gathers damp, fiery strands at the nape of her neck. 

“Many an unpleasant title I’ve been given, but ‘death’ is a new one.” 

Melisandre lifts her head just enough to discern the king’s figure behind her. “Better death than you,” she mutters. “Leave me alone.“

Shockingly, he does not seem offended. “Someone has to hold your hair.” 

“Were it not for you, I’d not be heaving in the first place,” she snaps. 

Stannis has the decency to show remorse, kneeling to right the scarlet robe that has slipped from her shoulders. It is a cumbersome thing, the loose garment she’s used to hide her condition thus far. And it won’t be long before it fails to quiet the whispers. The priestess has suffered such nagging gossip before, of course, but this time their salacious suspicions will be proven true. 

_May as well make the most of it._

“You shall massage my feet next,” Melisandre sniffs, putting on airs. 

The king grimaces, ever dour. But she thinks she glimpses an adoring smile before sickness overcomes her once more. 


	22. Lips II

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** basorexia

When the priestess moves to his side, gaze locked on the maps before them, his mind seems to cease functioning. A desire overcomes him until he can think of nothing else, nothing but the warm, forbidden memory of her mouth. 

Melisandre’s lips are moving now. Surely there is sound coming out, but Stannis is busy observing the soft dip of her upper lip, as smooth as the curve of an archer’s bow. _How sweet it tastes_. Sweat prickles his neck, forms into beads when her lips part, trickles beneath the collar of his doublet with each feverish pulse of her ruby.

Her lips move again, the same movement over and over, and he realises that she’s asked a question. “Yes,” he blurts, hoping it is the right answer. 

Those red eyes turn to him. “Yes?”

Stannis stares back in bewilderment, then scans the room for some kind of clue.

Amusement tugs at the corner of her mouth. “I asked what you were thinking of, my king. You seem distracted.” 

“I— ” Can he give a lie?  _No._ How can he respond, then? _‘I was studying the proportions of your mouth like a boy barely grown?’_

“You can dream all day,” Melisandre teases, “or you could actually kiss me.”


	23. Words

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** Mamihlapinatapei

As ever, Melisandre winds an arm through his and speaks sweetly of R’hllor, sharing her latest visions from the fire. He does not contribute much in return; on a cheerful day Stannis Baratheon gives the occasional grunt or derisive snort. Today it is dark and bitter atop the Wall, threatening to freeze his tongue solid, and not even his priestess’s warm company can coax words from him. 

“You don’t hear a word I’m saying, do you?”

“Very few,” answers the king. 

“So why are you still walking with me?”

He tugs her along at his impatient speed. “Ah, Melisandre, it is better to suffer your religious talk than to forgo these walks entirely.”

“Why?”

Stannis groans, turning to regard her where she’s halted. “Why  _what?_ Must I provide an excuse for tolerating your presence?”

Melisandre bites her lip, a furrow in her brow. “Your Grace,” she begins. The priestess struggles to meet his gaze, red eyes flickering to the ice beneath her boots. “I…”   _I will push on with you, if ever there is a chance you might be converted—truly converted. You are my lord, my king, my warrior of light. The fire shows me things I cannot comprehend, but you…you slip into my bed at night and I feel so certain, so at peace, a peace I’ve never felt before…_ “I am gladdened to hear you tolerate my presence,” she finishes cooly. 

Her red velvet cloak brushes the snow as she turns. Stannis catches her arm, but when she glances back at him, he is wordless as ever. After a moment, the lines of his face soften. 

 _My priestess,_ he means to say, _mine own shadow, do not you see? The truth requires no rambling flatteries. Men call me cold and unfeeling; how little they know. It is because I feel so deeply, care too much, that I am the way I am. When my wife begs to be married again, I long only to leap the flames with you. When my bed is cold it is you I glimpse in the fire, fingers braiding your copper hair and cheeks kissed by rosy heat. You are the only thing I see, the ruby flame everywhere I turn._ “May I visit your bedchamber tonight?” he murmurs instead.

Melisandre sighs, and it is a sigh that says _always, my king._


	24. Goodbyes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **6 sentence prompts:** "teach me how to say goodbye"

When the king bids her farewell the first time, sending her back to Dragonstone like a trinket that has lost its shine, she is far too enraged to bother with words.

The second time is when he leaves her at the Wall. Goodbyes are unnecessary; he will be back. Besides—their eyes speak all the words needed, bittersweet and stinging from the cold. 

They cannot fight or steal kisses the third time (she tries, but his heart has ceased beating in his chest, and they are trying to take his body to the pyre). The third time is the final time, and yet it is the first time Melisandre realises no one’s ever taught her how to say goodbye. 


	25. Lovers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **6 sentence prompts:** "Come back to sleep."

A hand catches her waist as she begins to slip from bed.   
Melisandre falls still at the touch; she sighs quietly, and then she waits.  
The fire calls,  _always does it call,_  but when she is pulled between her two lovers, the king’s hold is usually stronger.  _Will tonight prove the same?_  
“Come back to sleep,” he murmurs.  
She does. 


	26. Games

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompts:** "I really don't know why but whenever I hear "Toxic" from Britney Spears I imagine Stannis and Mel running through Dragonstone like silly childs while Stannis is chasing her and some kisses in between before Mel continues running / “I’m a slave to your game” / strikhedonia

“My lady, I should like to show you Windwyrm.” The king held out his arm, then frowned when she did not take it at once. “Will you not accompany me?” 

Melisandre turned away. “Only if you can catch me, my king.”

He squinted. “Only— ?”

“If you can catch me,” she confirmed, then slipped around the stone archway without another sound. 

Stannis stood dumbfounded for a while, debating whether to be offended or amused. “To the hells with it,” he muttered. A passing kitchenmaid shrieked as her lord rounded the corner at a furious pace. 

“Move aside,” he barked. And still he knocked over more than one dim figure in his reckless pursuit. Dragonstone was a dark castle, growing blacker with each shadow and curve, but the king would not be deterred from scouring it top to bottom.

 _No!_   He halted dead in his tracks, a realisation dawning in his mind.  _She will gravitate toward the light._ Sure enough, nimble footfalls could be faintly heard at the edge of the Stone Drum, echoing across a stone bridge toward his original destination. Windwyrm’s dragon lofted high into the sky, seeking out a rare patch of sun amidst the foggy gloom.  _Is that not like my Melisandre?_  As if on cue, there was a flash of scarlet behind the narrow window, ascending the tower at a steady pace.

 _I have her now._ He stalked across the bridge and tore up the stairs two at a time, much as he had years ago in pursuit of Targaryen children. But this time he was closing in until his prize was right before him. 

The red blur yelped when he caught it around the waist. “Is this my runaway priestess?” he wondered. 

Melisandre fell into a fit of giggles as he trapped her against the wall and kissed her soundly. “We look like children,” she mused, trying to catch her breath.

He nipped at her rosy bottom lip. “By your own fault.”

“You did not have to chase me…”

“Didn’t I?” His knuckles brushed a silky hip and thigh, fingers tangling within soft layers of red. "Don’t you see how I bend to your will, how I burn and ache for you? I’m a slave to your game, priestess…”

Melisandre arched her hips forward to entice him, only to deny his next hungry kiss. “We’ll play a while longer then,” she whispered. 

And just like that, the red figure twisted away and slipped from his grasp once more. 


	27. Sleep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _1 sentence prompts_ : fluff + hurt/comfort

**i.** For once she desires to sleep all night, and all day too—and for once the king is the high-spirited one, rumbling with laughter at the way formidable Melisandre yawns and buries her nose back into the pillow.

* * *

 

 **ii.** “Everyone believes it a simple thing,” she whispers, “they never know how much it hurts, how much I…" and she trails off because Stannis  _does_  know,  _does_  see the pain in her eyes and the tears and the blood each night, and all he can do is scoop her up from her chair by the fire and tuck her beneath the furs of his bed.


	28. Babies II

“She is a fat baby,” Melisandre mutters, and the maester assures her all Baratheon babies are large, but she did not  _want_  this fat baby, _she most certainly did not want to push this fat baby from her body,_ though it is almost worth it to see Shireen squishing her sister protectively to her chest and Stannis trying not to gaze proudly at his raven-haired girls.


	29. Flowers

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> **Prompt:** "'Do you... think you might be pregnant?' Or using whatever phrasing Stannis might use"

Hands caught his when he began pulling at the scarlet ties of her robe. “Gentle, my king. My flower is in bloom.” And she pushed him carefully away.

“My lady, that must be good news, but I don’t particularly care.” Stannis knew he was being insistent tonight—perhaps _too_ insistent _—_ yet he had little choice, with desire pulsing painfully through his veins. 

“You don’t?” Melisandre lifted an eyebrow, but all he could focus on were her lips, red and ripe as summer berries. “You don’t care?” she repeated. 

 _Gods, what is she going on about?_ “I didn’t even know you had a flower.”

“All women have flowers, Stannis.”

He blanched. “Ah.”

“You didn’t know?” she teased, watching as he retreated a safe distance.

“Quiet, woman. I didn’t know you meant  _that_  flower. To be truthful, it had been a while…I had begun to wonder…” 

“Yes?”

The tips of his ears burned. “If you…might be…with child.”

Melisandre offered a small smile. “Fear not, my king. I take many precautions.”

“To be sure,” he nodded. “But it can still happen.”

“Not to me.” Perhaps realising she’d revealed more than she should have, Melisandre blinked and brushed over it. “I…We have R’hllor to thank that it has not, nor will it ever.”

“Never?” he blurted. 

The priestess narrowed her red eyes at him. “Of course not.”

Another heavy moment passed, and then they began to speak awkwardly over each other. “But sometimes, the thought— ”

“—a nightmare,” she said sharply.

 _A nightmare?_ The king thought about that. _Yes, a nightmare._ The image of her big with child— 

_My child._

Gods and pride be damned! Mayhaps it would please him, her belly growing with his babe…

_No. There is nothing that would please you in siring a bastard._ _You’d be disgusted with her all swollen, knowing you did that to her, spilled your seed inside your priestess when it should have been your wife, knowing you’re no better than Robert—_

“The worst nightmare,” he grimaced. 

“You are thinking of your brother, aren’t you?” Melisandre’s voice was rarely so flat. 

“What? No. I mean it. Such a…situation can never happen.” 

“You are not convincing me.” 

Stannis groaned and leaned back against the headboard. “No need to worry about that now. The mood was killed and then bludgeoned some more.” He glanced uneasily at her, clearing his throat. “Are you—does it…hurt?”

Her eyes betrayed amusement. “My flower?” 

The king felt he might die where he lay. Melisandre stifled a giggle and gathered her robe tight about her shoulders, the pale treasure tucked out of reach once more. This pulled the red silk taut over her middle, and again he was tortured with the thought of her pregnant. “Moonblood is only a little pain,” she was saying. “Pain is no stranger to me, nor I to him.”

Stannis frowned, feeling troubled by her response. He wished to comfort her.  _But how?_ His words were all wrong, and his embrace could hardly be soothing, given the harshness of his frame, all battle-hardened skin and sharp bones… 

He brooded a while before coming to a decision, but by then Melisandre had already dozed off on his chest as if it were a pile of down feathers. 


	30. Protection

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Prompt:** "Hey!Idk if requests are open(?)but I have those idea for so long now.At least 4 months but anyway it's Stannis/Mel and Mel is furious of him for some reason maybe because he 'protects' her from the black brothers or Idk.And as they are screaming at each other Stannis suddenly gets behind her and pulls her to him to sooth her.She tried to escape "let me go" and with every time she says it she gets quieter and they end up Stannis teacher her a lesson. I hope it is okay? Love you  <3"

“I do not need your protection _,_  Sire, certainly not if it comes at the price of my walking and speaking freely.” 

Stannis was distracted by her pacing, marveling at the way her eyes seemed to dim and spark like the flames in the corner of her bedchamber. “My lady,” came his weary sigh. Melisandre knew he was about to rebuke her. 

“Don’t,” she interrupted. “I am not a helpless thing for you to store away and condescend. Never treat me this way again.” 

Stannis recoiled in shock. She had always played the faithful advisor—it was far from her custom to fling inflamed, vitriolic words at him. He seemed in equal parts terrified and admiring and enraged. “In what way have I treated you, Melisandre?” The king set to grinding his teeth. “As a noble lady, with respect and favours at every turn, and commands that men respect you likewise? Tell me. How shall I treat you instead?”

“As a woman,” she said. The last word cut into the air like a little dagger, swift and sharp and very dangerous.

“A woman.”

“Yes, a woman!” Melisandre gripped the edge of her brazier, feeling the holy flames lick her pale fingers, clinging to that pain for stability. He had never seen her so defiant before, never, and it showed in his stormy eyes. “My king, I am R’hllor’s instrument, and I am your loyal subject, but I must come and go as I please. Deny me that little freedom and I can never serve you properly.”

Stannis grit his teeth again. “You’ve a dramatic turn of tongue. I simply do not want you talking to the dirty, depraved men of this Wall. Am I so unfair?” 

 _Unfair._ Melisandre wished to claw at her porcelain skin to show him how much his precious justice was worth.  _Show him your scars, your pain, the blood and the tears and the bruises around your neck._ “I never asked fairness from you,” she said coldly. “Do not forget the power I possess.” He did not attempt to hide his snort, prompting her to whirl around. “It seems you already have,” she hissed.

Stannis looked at her almost sadly. “You have power, my lady. But at what cost?”

“'At what _cost?’”_  She scoffed. “A man lectures me of cost, after threatening mine own freedom? What a wonder! Ser Davos is kingdoms away, and somehow he whispers in your ear.”

“You mock me with a child’s tongue, Melisandre. See that this insolence is exhausted before speaking again.”

She turned back to her brazier. “As you wish. I shall be a devoted servant, Sire, without complaint. Lock me away until you have use of me.”

Rather than stoking it, her words seemed to cool his temper. The king frowned. “I have offended you.”  _Worse. You have doubted me, after all we’ve been through._ “And what would you have me do, my lady? Surely you understand my concerns…what is it you want me to do?”

 _I want you to understand, to believe in my abilities. I want a world that is not dark. It will be so dark and cold and c_ _ruel unless we do this right, unless I—_ “I want you to leave now,” she muttered. “I must retire.”

She could see the hurt in his gaze. His eyes were deep and dark like bruises, like the blue-black waves when she’d first arrived on Dragonstone.  _Like the churning water of a river in Essos, licking at her bloodied feet—_

She flinched at the hand on her waist. “Please leave, my king.”

“Melisandre— ” 

“I said get away from me,” she snapped, wrenching his forearms violently from her. “Don’t touch me!”

He held her tighter, trapping her against his broad chest. “Melisandre, stop this!”

 _Melisandre, Melisandre._ He was like that ugly bird in the solar, barking out repeated phrases. 

 _And you?_   _Melony, Melony, foolish girl, willful thing. He is right. You struggle like a child, a weak, worthless—_

“Let me  _go!”_

_Am I so unfair, Melony, when I speak the truth?_

Her eyes burned with tears. “Please let me go.”

“I will not, Melisandre. Never.”

After a moment of deafening silence, the room came into focus once more. She looked down in shame, stiffening against the arms that restrained her. “Forgive me, my king. I was….”

“Thrashing like a wildcat in perpetual heat.” 

“Forgive me,” she repeated. Dully, the king nodded. He had seen her unwell before. She was usually able to explain it away, to find the blessing in a trickle of dark blood or a fit of hysteria.  _I have glimpsed such things in the flames, my king. It was R’hllor’s voice and R’hllor’s fiery hand, reaching to me, favouring me._

Yet Stannis did not care for gods, not even her god, not even the god who heated his sword and his heart. He did not understand why she must suffer for her art.  _My king, if only you could see. I have such things in my mind, tormenting me, branding me forever a slave._  

“Was it the Lord of Light? This…vision?” 

“It was a blessing, my king.” Stannis gathered her close with a grim look, holding her head to the solid quilt of his doublet. “I don’t need your protection,” she whispered. Still, no argument left her as he stroked the length of her copper hair. 

“I know,” he admitted. “But you will always have it.”


	31. Battles

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Prompts:** "everyone can see it" + "secret baby"

Everyone can see that the king is injured, no matter how he grimaces to hide it after the Battle for Winterfell. They do not stop the Lady Melisandre from tearing through the castle when she arrives. She is a desperate flurry of red, copper hair mussed in her haste to be reunited with His Grace. 

Moon after moon passes. The priestess tends to his wound, they say, soothes him with her strange Asshai’i tonics and spells. It had been a longsword that stuck deep between his ribs, and the healing is slow. Queen’s men fret that his ill health is some punishment from R’hllor. King’s men groan that they are losing valuable time to move south. The battle against the Boltons had been a decisive victory, and they have Sansa Stark to rule Winterfell, but now the king is locked away in Eddard Stark’s old rooms.

Maids take turns pressing their ear to the door.  _Not all of His Grace is injured,_ they report in whispers and giggles around the castle.  _There is at least one part of him in fine working condition._

When the king finally emerges, everyone can see he is much improved. The flesh on his bones has filled out for the first time in years, the bruises beneath his blue eyes have faded, his face is less gaunt and hollow, his stride once more strong. (His priestess seems to have filled out, too, but the queen’s men had not been praying for that, and pretend not to notice.)

“Your Grace must take King’s Landing now,” they cry, “for surely no man can withstand your power!”  _For your lady wife awaits you in the southron kingdoms, long departed from the Nightfort, don’t you understand?_

But the king is in no rush to leave the North. Servants say Lady Stark lifts an eyebrow when she hears of this inconvenience, before the ghost of a smile graces her lips. “He must love her greatly.”

“My lady?”

Sansa does not turn from the window, as she is deep in thought. “Why else would he remain?” 

Several more months pass—long, increasingly uncomfortable months. A pale blue dawn is breaking one morning, lazy snowflakes drifting about the courtyard, when at last the castle is roused by piercing cries. 

Two chambermaids catch a glimpse of the king in Melisandre’s rooms, holding the plump, raven-haired bundle. “You have a sister waiting for you in the south,” he murmurs, in a gentle voice they have never heard before. 

Not everyone attends when he holds a proper little nameday feast. The Florents are safely south, easing the worst of the scandal, but some bannermen are outraged all the same. The king grumbles in return, “If it were  _Robert’s_  child…” 

Oblivious, the babe squirms amidst her swaddling, seeming uninterested in offerings of knitted gold and fine-spun silk. She cries in fiercer protest when the king blesses her chest with ashes, seeming to mislike the soot as much as he. Her tears subside only when the priestess sings in soothing High Valyrian. 

Lady Stark is not offended by such a spectacle, as one might expect—merely amused. This southron king had given her Winterfell. She decides to commission a woolen cloak for the child and have it embroidered with scarlet beads from Myr, hoping to please the priestess. 

Everyone notices the way Melisandre is perched amongst her own gifts in the back of the hall, the new rubies twinkling beneath her crimson veils. They wonder why she covers her face, and it is explained that a woman of her faith must be untouched and unseen for a fortnight after birth.

Yet she is far, far less hidden than she should be. _His Grace must love this priestess,_  they agree.  _Why else would he be so enamoured with her bastard? Why else shame the queen so openly?_

“Let him have this evening,” Lady Stark quiets them. “He has many battles to fight in the south.”


	32. Red

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Prompt:** "if I can't have her, no one will"

Red is not so popular a colour in the Stormlands. Red does not last; far too quickly such dyes wither and crust with salt. In Dorne they drape themselves in frivolous samite, scarlet and maroon and every shade of red they can import from Lys. 

The women of his kingdom dress as they ought instead, in blue-black or pale gold, their bodices stitched with little twinkling gems from the sea. Their heads blink with light as they turn, but only when the sun is out to catch the beads woven into their braids. The sun is not often seen in his kingdom. Stormland ladies compete with the sea—not the sun. Stormland women mute themselves beneath cloaks of wind-beaten leather.

Melisandre is neither samite nor sea. She is red, and red, and red.

 _Have you seen her hair?_  the servants whisper. Stannis has seen it. Deep copper all burnished and shining in candlelight. It catches his eye during the feast. How rare, how strange a hue, more brilliant than any Lysene dye…

 _Have you seen her eyes?_ the septas hiss.Stannis has seen those, too, gotten lost in their flames when she tilts her copper head up. Other men are staring at her, as if caught in the same trap. 

“Be seated at my right,” he commands. She obeys in a swirl of red silk. His wife wears a brittle smile at his left. Cressen is frowning in the archway of the hall, Davos wide-eyed at his bench. 

 _And her lips, those are red too._ Words spill from her lips into his ear, a lilting accent wrapping around his mind. _Her lips, and that ruby—_  

“Lady Melisandre.” His voice is low and hoarse. “You speak so queerly, as in riddles.” He wants her to stop talking. He wants her to talk all evening.

“If it please you, my lord, I am simply Melisandre.” 

Men are still staring at her, knights from both sides of the austere, damp hall, drawn like pathetic moths to a dazzling red flame. 

Stannis grinds his teeth. “It shall please me to call you ‘Lady Melisandre.’” They all hear him, each and every person in that room, and are quick to avert their eyes. 

But Melisandre smiles at him from beneath her lashes _. They have had their fill of gawking,_  he thinks, _now let them whisper how she is my lady, this red priestess from Asshai._


End file.
